The Politics of Food Labeling and Certification - The Oxford Topic of Food, Politics, and Society - page 614

outlines these debates by highlighting some of the central claims made by proponents
of food labeling as well as some key critiques, focusing particularly on Fair Trade and
Organic certification standards; it also reviews existing research to evaluate positions in
these debates.2 The central question is: does food certification work?
Scholarly work on food certification and labeling is part of a broader literature on
political consumerism, which understands the act of purchasing certain goods as a
political act, in parallel to more conventional forms of political participation. Different
strands of the literature, however, conceptualize political consumption variously as a
substitute for and as a complement to more traditional forms of political involvement.
On the one hand, politicized consumption may be seen as yet another form of political
participation for people who already use formal public channels to express their politi-
cal preferences.3 On the other hand, market-based political action may be used as an
alternative to formal public channels of political participation, particularly for margin-
alized or underrepresented groups. Scholars who emphasize both of these perspectives
agree that the consumption of certain goods should be seen as a form of political action.
Despite the proliferation of certification programs in recent decades, the phenome-
non of politicized consumption is not new. The history of ethical consumerism has roots
in boycott strategies. In the 1790s, the British antislavery movement introduced a boy-
cott against sugar produced by West Indian slaves, establishing the consumer boycott as
what Tarrow calls a repertoire of contention (Sussman 1994, Tarrow 1994). Later social
movements such as the civil rights movement and labor movements in the United States
and the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa followed suit, using consumer boy-
cotts to sanction companies that violated the movements' principles. Although much of
this early consumer activism was in the form of punitive or negative boycotts, examples
of what Boström and Klintman call “positive political consumerism” date back to the
early nineteenth century. To protest the use of slave labor in producing consumer goods,
the American “free produce” movement began opening retail stores in the 1830s that
sold goods made with free labor (Faulkner 2007). Half a century later, in 1898, a labeling
scheme called the White Label Campaign was organized by the National Consumers'
League to distinguish products made in American factories that ensured improved
working conditions (Boström and Klintman 2006). This approach—rewarding compa-
nies that engage in “good” practices as opposed to punishing companies that engage in
“bad” practices—is mirrored in today's ethical labeling initiatives.
Today's certification and labeling schemes are aimed at remedying a litany of pressing
problems in both the developed and the developing world, particularly in the areas of
labor conditions, environmental sustainability, animal welfare, and health.
Labor conditions for farmers in developing countries are at the forefront of the con-
cerns behind labels like Fair Trade, union-made, and GoodWeave. Small farmers are
among the most economically vulnerable populations in the developing world. Half of
the world's undernourished people, three-quarters of Africa's malnourished children,
and the majority of people living in absolute poverty work on small farms (International
Food Policy Research Institute IFPRI 2005). Child labor, though almost completely
eradicated in the developed world, is still a reality in low-income countries. The most